iWork update September 2018 - lost compatibility

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iWork update September 2018 - lost compatibility

I have an iMac (late 2011) and a iPhone 7, in which I installed the latest updates of iWork.

I also work with a iPad (3rd generation) and a MacBook (late 2008), in which those updates are not available, since they only support iOS9 and MacOS El Capitan.

I just realized that the iWork documents which were opened with the latest iWork apps are not accessible anymore from the older devices! I'm very stressed, since I really need them in my MacBook and in my iPad.

Does anyone know what should I do? Can I turn bak the update? Are there more Apple users with this issue?

iPad Wi-Fi, iOS 9.3.5

Posted on Sep 21, 2018 7:44 AM

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Answer 1

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aphonso Author

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Sep 22, 2018 4:37 AM in response to aphonso

I found out how to overcome this: if you open the incompatible file online, on icloud.com, it becomes accessible by older devices. Until you open it by one of the newer versions; at that time, it stops working again in older devices.

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Answer 2

aphonso Author

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Oct 29, 2018 9:22 AM in response to aphonso

Unfortunately, the problem came again. Now, it says I shroud update iWork apps for the latest version in order to open the files. The thing is: with my 3rd generation iPad (iOS 9) and with my late 2008 MacBook (Mac OS Sierra), THERE ARE NO MORE AVAILABLE UPDATES!

Apple probably just forgot the users with older hardware. I'm OK with not accessing new features, but please, Apple, at least do not kill the possibility of using iWork!

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Answer 3

Nov 10, 2018 2:55 AM in response to aphonso

Hi,

I recently discovered that the new update had broken file compatibility with the older versions of iWork as well. I have yet to try it but you may find that exporting your file as a Pages '09 file will allow it to open with both versions of Pages you have. The conversion may make changes to layout and certain features may be lost but for simpler documents this should work OK. The problem this will cause is that on opening in a newer version of Pages it will save your file in its own format and it will be necessary to export every time, not to save.

I understand as well how much of a pain this is. The only fix would be to update your hardware to something which supports more recent versions of iOS / macOS and the newer versions of iWork.

I never understood why more recent iWork would not work on the older OSes, especially as MS Office offers support for them just fine.

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iWork update September 2018 - lost compatibility

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